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God I love pro wrestling.

In Impact 14 years ago, there was a Wrestler called Rob Terry. He comes from Swansea, Wales. Taz' co-commentator, Jerermy Borash was attempting to put Swansea over by mentioning all the famous people who came from the area. Now Dylan Thomas isn't a very contemporary reference, but there were a couple of people who are. Tom Jones, and Catherine Zeta Jones. And mentioning those two back to back caused Taz to fixate upon the name Jones for the rest of the broadcast, and indeed all subsequent broadcasts.

The first Dynamite since Double or Nothing 2023. Only things confirmed are Adam Cole/Dr. Britt Baker vs. Chris Jericho/Saraya which I couldn't care less about and a Tony Khan announcement about Collision. We also hear from Konosuke Takeshita/Don Callis. Much bigger, this Dynamite falls on my Dad's birthday. Happy birthday, Dad. Thanks for everything you do for me. Have yourself a good un and I love you xxx.

Re-told my Sabu story from 11/2021 so mine as well re-tell my Corbin story from 3/2019. One of the coolest dudes I've ever met.

BIG AEW/NJPW SPOILER:

I'm going to 3(!) AEW shows this month!!!

Joe, Goldberg, Roman, all World Champions having well-received reigns. This was for a midcard belt with people sick of the reign, and those are huge distinctions. Jade went Double or Nothing at Double or Nothing and paid for it. Thematic relevance trumps all.

Happy Pride Month everybody. Love is love and the world needs that xxx.

Look, a match! This has the right mix of random, logical, and local.

I wouldn’t believe Hogan if he told me water was wet. Or not hot.

So many men talking other men's physiques during day one of Pride month. *breathes in and exhales as if it's a fresh mountain breeze* Love to see it

Yep. I was all about the DOOM AND GLOOM but now I'm all about the NEVER ASSUME. Let the good times resume. I presume. Turns out prowrestling is still the focus. That Rampage. Love EVERYTHING about that. Darn near brings a tear to ole Gordlow's eye. What a molten crowd tonight! It makes SUCH a difference. THROW WIDE THE GATES OF AGONY! It was kind of funny when they cut to the crowd while Don was trying to speak and there were dudes in Bullet Club t-shirts vociferously booing the bad guys. (Because in my opinion Bullet Club are a "heel faction"). I will certainly watch the first couple of episodes of The Punk Show out of (morbid?) curiosity but I actually kind of hope it will turn out to be for-me-personally skippable. Partly (mainly?) because Saturday there is Sunday here and Sunday is when Papa Gordlow plays with his daughters (who are otherwise too busy with school, cram school, ballet, piano, calligraphy...) So my purely selfish hope is that they feature Punk constantly and Casey et al. just love it and are so happy but also they make JR permanent lead announcer exclusive to Collision and also move Jarrett and Saraya there but FTR still wrestle on Dynamite and Rampage etc etc... (Also Juice cuts promos on Collision but throws punches on Rampage and Dynamite). Kind of curious what everyone else's secret selfish wishes are for The Punk Show Brand Split and Draft Spectacular. Like, maybe Matt wants Hangman and Takeshita moved somewhere exclusively, where, say, Dustin never goes, Drew would most likely prefer at least one show with zero Matt Nick Cole participation, Natural might watch more of whichever show Penta and Sammy don't appear on, and Andy from Kansas would like Cody to be able to cross over...? I wonder if it is POSSIBLE to book three shows so that each and every one of us can see all of our favourites on two of them and have one show that's skippable-for-us-personally. Probably not. Personal tastes are not that logical. Anyway, I am mostly back to being a frothing-at-the-mouth fanboy for at least a couple more days. Feels nice. What a show!

Alexa's partner looks like he makes Youtube reaction videos

For fuck's sake how can they end Honky Tonk's historic IC Title reign with NO BUILD? Ugh what an utter disgrace of a booking decision!!11!!!! They should have had Warrior calling him out with Honky Tonk dodging him for weeks with different excuses! Lol just a little exaggerated but food for thought. Sometimes fans get stuck too deep in the conventional wisdom bubble. Just because things happen a certain way more often than not doesn't mean when something different happens it's bad. Jade's loss was actually one of the best bits of booking they've done. She didn't get destroyed. She didn't get ruined. She doesn't have the stink of failure on her for losing. Ryback was dead when he lost to Punk. Goldberg was mostly dead when he lost to Nash. Jade is still protected and can easily say it was a fluke and still move up the ladder due to the manor she lost. Stat also gets a giant shot in the arm right out of the return gate. Wrestling needs surprises. This was a perfectly done one. It almost had the buzz of a surprise MITB cash in. It was just a great piece of business and a creative way to past Jade's streak and not turn her into just another person.

I never want to hear Wild Thing again

After a really -- really -- shitty week on my end, I needed this. Opener suffered from Vikingo groveling on the floor too much while the other two went round and round the ring. They could have used the extra time for the other matches; this is lucha from three guys who can do anything aerially, just do a total super sprint. It was still solid though. I brought up in the Discord that they could have put a time limit with judges raising up signs with points like an old-schoolly Olympics competition to see who'd win based on highspots, with with no idea that there was a Pure match at the top of the card where they pretty much do a variation of that. Also Kommander needs camo gear. I also said that it feels like Jarrett is booking his own matches and posited that Aubrey gets five minutes alone with Karen while Jeff/Satnam/Jay are above the ring in a cage. It feels very much like something Tony would sign off on. Continuing the hilarity we get MORE RULES for ZSJ/Andretti. ZSJ is such a wizard on the mat, always a delight to watch him work; Andretti is growing and this was a fine sit under the learning tree. God Sabre Jr. rules. We go back to regular wrestling for Willow vs. Emi! Willow's music sounds like the Night Court theme! It too rules! They proceed to have a kiiiiiiler Joshi Hoss Match. The PnP felt like it cut in worse than even the last match though. No matter, both gals lay into each other and play to the back row and it's the shit. Willow's Doctor-Liger-Bomb after having to beat down Emi just extra enough... excellent. Lots of Kobashi chopping from Willow too. Back to The Rules! They only got ten minutes (and three rope breaks) but Tony is still contractually obligated to throw in another goddamned PnP. Did catch Andrade in the Collision commercial this time though. The opening matwork in this is level to or possibly scalps the stuff in the ZSJ/Andretti tag but has the added benefit of Tiga Style being willing to try and kick your head off as bad as Shibata does. A rushed war of attrition and the finish is so final it hurts you sitting there in the chair. Great great stuff. Methinks JR had a boner through the whole thing with how he was coming off. EDIT: AxB mentioned that the beginning of Shibata's theme sounds just like "No Scrubs" by TLC. Try to unhear THAT now, haha.

It's like A_K_ never left. **wipes tear away**

Holy shit was that show great until the last 15-20 minutes which were...not very good to very bad. What a hot crowd, too! The heat for Callis and fucking Lard Lad had me worried someone was going to jump the rails. Somewhere, DEAN~! is saying to us “I hate three-ways but that was a great match. Sneaky Style, Tall Guy doing Tall Guy things, and Trent (is he one of the best wrestlers in the company?)” Plus we get Darby and OC, the two best damn pinballs in the company, getting repeatedly ragdolled and giving a huge rub to two huge young dudes. Both Toa and Kaun (and I will not engage in the hoss debate, by AEW standards Kaun is a hoss, Periodt) are really quick for their size. BCC vs. Lucha Bandidos was every bit as great as expected. Two of the top bases in the company vs. two incredible flyers, Penta there making the fans happy and challenging Adam Cole for the thigh-slapped of the year award, and Yuta being a dick and getting another win. I’m here for Death Jitsu. and how about the women’s title match? Fierce, stiff, competitive, both women looked great, good story throughout the match, a huge moment for Stat getting Nyla into the falcon arrow (?) and holy shit a 450 splash!! The show pretty much over delivered throughout the night in ring and out. And then a stacked as hell Rampage card! Willow vs Emi! I feel like that’s AEW literally saying “sorry for letting you down some recently John, here you go, enjoy!” AEW RULES THE MUTHAFUCKIN UNIVERSE

Tony's gonna hear the grumbling and book Darby vs Rush. Everybody remain loud and cranky!

This is pertmuch exactly my kind of show. I love it when AEW give us something like this. Just good to great, fun, interesting pro wrestling match-ups with a ton of variety. AAA Mega Heavyweight Champion El Hijo del Vikingo defends vs. Dralistico vs.Komander Very likely to be the really, really good and exciting kind of spot fest. I had long been waiting and hoping for Vikingo to show up in AEW and he has NOT disappointed in the least. It's almost as fun seeing everyone else mark out for him as it is watching him. And it ain't exactly like Komander and Dralistico are chopped liver. It would be enough for this to be merely spectacular, but there is a real chance that they'll give us some kind of little story as well. Like if Vai, Yngwie, and Satriani were jamming and decided to play Cause We've Ended as Lovers with intense emotion (while also outdoing each other pyrotechnically). NJPW World Television Champion Zack Sabre Jr. defends against Action Andretti. I totally agree with Matt here. This very much has the feel of a flashy young gun being put into a situation where we will all learn something about him. If he can hang, technically, with ZSJ then I feel like he's gonna earn some respect. Likening it to a young wrestler being thrown in there with Regal (or Finlay) seems really apt. I'm pulling for the kid to put up a good showing. Ring of Honour Pure Champion Katsuyori Shibata defends against Lee Moriarty.I It weirds me out to think that Shibata vs Orange was over half a year ago, and the G1 grappling match with ZSJ was over a year prior to that! Time f'n flies. Like always, I'm on tenterhooks. I love watching Shibata fight but I'll never not be scared. Unlike Andretti, I don't feel like Tiga Style has anything to prove. i feel like this is more a chance for him to shine. Just. PLEASE. Don't headbutt Shibata. NJPW Strong Women's Champion Willow Nightingale defends against Emi Sakura. Oh. Hell. Yeah. If I were booking, this would be the main event. Possibly, I am higher on Emi than many of you. I think we are all equally high on Willow, and rightly so. I can't help but wish that our dearly missed old friend could be watching and commenting on this one with us. Though, I can guess what he would likely say.

Uggggh, I’m gonna do it. I’ll get the extra version for FTR. I’m excited. I want to play @The Natural online and be Penta. I may lose, but I will spam taunt so hard.

Count me in as a guy who doesn’t “get” Adam Cole, but he seems like such a nice guy that reading all these admittedly legitimate criticisms has paradoxically made me really root for the fucker. So I guess I like Adam Cole now. Fuck you.

Dear lord, if this years All Out they can build to an Anarchy in the Arena type match called Brawl Out with the Elite vs CM Punk Sympathizers, I’ll shake the great Tony’s hand on a masterful long term booking/ talent management save. If they don’t collide, give me a different thing that is neat.

Isn't that already the state-motto of Florida?

I understand why you can't make t-shirts out of a quote like " People Have Been Giving Me a Lot of Hoopla About Biting the Big Lizard’s Finger" but I would consider buying a bumper sticker.

Let's wait and see what kind of heat they get for the eventual Dynamite gender reveal.

One thing that is somewhat undeniable is that they've brought in a ton of ex-WWE backstage talents over the last few years. Some of this is due to WWE downsizing. Some of it is because the guys at the top of the WWE chain refuse to retire. Some of it is a cascading effort. I do think there's been a noticeable shift from Keith Mitchell leaving to there being a void for a bit to Michael Mansury taking over. Yes, we don't see it in quick camera cuts or WWE style buzzwords, but there are things like the talking heads before the PPV on Sunday that feel a little bit unquestionable. Some of it is good. Some is bad. I personally miss having a few extra pre-show matches but I like wrestling. Even Renee coming in gives it a certain feel. Jarrett as Director of Business Development. Etc. They just brought in a new Social Media/Communications guy (Adam Hopkins) who had been with WWE for 25 years. I know from my job, we bring in a lot of people from another agency a lot because we have to hire local and if we do, this is one of the only places where there was comparable work being done and we have to spend the first six months shaking them of their former corporate culture. On the one hand, it's good to bring in people with tons of expertise, but there's a difference between wrestling and between people who have only ever known WWE as what defines wrestling.

I agree - Jannetty might not be able to keep up at his age.

Last one:

My wife accidentally opened my phone to the ratings thread and now she’s salt.

Happy Pride Month everyone. Money in the Bank qualifiers galore! The beginning of the road to All In! And Phil Collins' favorite PPV... Against All Odds!

Boy did I pick a hell of a first wrestling PPV to attend! This is going to be GLORIOUS.

I dunno if I would call Orange Cassidy old. 40 in 2023 is like 22 y/o in 1983 years. You have to adjust for inflation. By inflation, I mean recreational drugs.

I hope he' paying for it out of his own pocket and not relying on anyone else.

At this point?!?!

Danny Masterson from That 70's Show has been found guilty of two out of three counts of rape. He faces up to 30 years in prison.

Also, the Outcasts fucking rule. It was a rough first few weeks, but they’ve been one of my favourite things in AEW recently

Great work, Tony! I never questioned ya!

Really dug that episode. Every match was fun, promo segments advanced things. Has anyone been booed in AEW the way Callis was tonight? Even the heeliest heels always have pockets of support in the crowd. Big Bill's whale tail. That is all

I’ve mentioned this before(probably in this very thread) but I could listen to Historian Cornette for hours upon hours. Podcast Cornette is a totally different story/gimmick.

Was there one match on Double or Nothing 2023 that was a really good straight-up pro wrestling match with a clean, satisfying finish and without a bunch of (unnecessary) bells and whistles? I'd argue that there wasn't. MAYBE the preshow match? "Really" good is a bit of a stretch... Ethan Page did some really good wrestling. I'd, personally, argue that at this point Jeff Hardy qualifies as an unnecessary bell and whistle. I very much enjoyed the Blackjack Battle Royale, but in my opinion that was not a straight-up pro wrestling match. I'm not trying to be controversial,but in my opinion Wizard vs Bay Bay was neither straight-up nor really good. There was, of course, some good wrestling in the FTR match but it was a Jarrett match and as such it was non-stop prowrestling bullshit and there was virtually zero chance of a clean satisfying finish and we all knew that going in. It's not for me, but that's fine. I'm not arguing that there should be ZERO matches of this type on a PPV, just that it would be very nice to also get one clean straight-up pro wrestling match in addition. Again, not trying to be controversial but ladder matches with biting are not straight up pro wrestling, as far as I'm concerned. POSSIBLY if Hayter had been healthy her match would have been straightforward and hard-hitting... But probably it still would have been built around Saraya interfering. Regardless of circumstances, we didn't get our straight-up very good match here. House Rules came pretty close, certainly there was really good wrestling going on. but probably you noticed some wildly unnecessary bells and whistles in the background of this one. If you consider Jade vs Taya and Jade vs Stat to be two separate things... MAYBE Jade vs Taya? But as a whole it seems to have left a significant number of people unsatisfied. Good wrestling, nice surprise, somewhat unsatisfying booking, in my opinion. The Pillar Fight was, like the Jarrett match, never intended or expected to finish clean. It's the current champ's deal, and that's fine. Certainly a very enjoyable match. Anarchy was never meant to be straight-up, obviously. The Takeshita thing does not, in my book, qualify as a clean finish. Still enjoyed the hell out of it. Again: Not asking for zero bells, zero whistles, zero bullshit, zero fuck finishes. Just wishing we could get ONE match where the wrestling was allowed to stand on its own and the finish was determined by actual wrestling. People used to complain that AEW gave us TOO MUCH of that! Possibly they are overreacting in the opposite direction now. DoN 2019 had Cody vs Dustin. Bloody, but straight-up. Clean finish. Great story. 2020 had Mox vs Brodie Lee, 2021 had Bucks vs Mox & Kingston and Shida vs Baker. Last Year we got Punk vs Hangman. Hopefully I am not misremembering and all of those had relatively clean finishes. Probably I'm misremembering, but... You get the idea.

The link to the twitter thread translating Tajiri's autobiography was already posted last year, but I think it's worth linking again because it has been semi-regularly updated since and I doubt many others have been refreshing it for the last six months like I have. Last update was in April.

Lord knows I don't want to tell you how to do your job-hobby as you do it as well as any of us, but the reason Wardlow/Cage isn't getting more love probably has something to do with Cole/Jericho. There were live viewers noticing the crowd being off during the opening matches (some reports of the crowd filling in late fwiw), but Cole/Jericho was a straight up ice bath. It's simultaneously the closest thing an AEW PPV has had to a momentum killing late-stage Vince McMahon booking disaster, while also being a workrate failure due simultaneous issues with Jericho's up-and-down old-man physical state + dramatic excesses & Adam Cole's worst-of-the-worst physical believability + indie proclivities. You can equally dog Jericho because he's booking his own stuff as you can Cole for like, NOT BEING ABLE TO UNDO A CHAIN AROUND HIS ANKLE and making the bad planned finish exponentially worse? There's a palpable sense of betrayal from the crowd when two established stars drop a turd like this on an AEW PPV. And then you've got the fact that so much of the other matches were based around shenanigans and run ins and plunder, even though Sabu and Britt were the high points of the match. The first two-thirds of the show can't really be understood unless you know how bad this was. It's legitimately interesting how many ways it failed both itself and the card as a whole. I understand modern wrestling better for having seen it. Even more interesting when you think Jericho vs. Roderick Strong from a couple of weeks ago was a similar match that was a thousand times better. I'm not telling you to put this on immediately, but if you're ever in the mood for an academic hate-watch this one contains multitudes of things to ponder. And it still isn't worse than what Matt Hardy did to All Out 2020.

I feel like I’m more positive on this show than the general consensus here. Jericho/Cole was the only outright stinker to me. And it was really bad. No idea what they were going for there. Randomly turning into a chain match at the end really summed it up well. Jamie/Toni wasn’t good, but I at least understand why it was overbooked gaga, and it didn’t overstay its welcome. Everything else was fun. I loved Stat’s return and I see no problem with hotshotting the belt onto her. It’s past time for Jade to move to another phase, and given Stat’s injury history, there’s no guarantee that her knees wouldn’t explode before you build her up for a title challenge. Just do the damn title change. Get the pop. Move forward. This was a heel getting her comeuppance. Jade has effectively spent most of 2023 squashing nobodies and while complaining that there’s no competition for her. She stuck her nose out too far tonight and she got what she asked for.

I preferred him as “The Punisher” Andrew Martin.

I wish the ignore feature worked to where I just didn't see the person's posts whatsoever. Like... vanish them like a ghost. Instead it's "this post is not visible because you have ignored the person" and there's no way I have the impulse control to ignore that. It's why I have so many Reese's cups in my freezer. (They were on sale this week.)

Some people were making fun of AEW for having a Night of Champions where none of the belts are AEW belts, but this show was what makes AEW great. They bring in the best from around the world (except those caught in the WWE universe of course, which is hermetically sealed to where there is no other wrestling), their wrestlers go and fight and win titles in other companies around the world. We get 4 different styles of matches and every single one of them was fucking great in its own way. Opening was a lucha spot fest in the best ways with a very lucha friendly crowd. Dralistico is a good guy to have because he’s the heel luchador right now, which they needed, and he’s a decent base. I liked him and Vikingo brawling outside while Komander was setting up his rope run senton. I didn’t expect anything but crazy spots out of this one and that is what I got. Andretti looked fine keeping up with ZSJ’s mat work and arm holds. The wrist stuff was great and the announcers did an excellent job of getting that over, so it felt like a big moment when Andretti was finally able to escape and free his wrist. After that, it was a style clash that mostly worked. Some of Sabre’s moves looked nasty and I was convinced he might legit dislocate a shoulder or elbow. Softening up the arm was also a sign that Sabre was going to wrestle his match, because normal strategy would be to take out the legs of a speedy flyer. The finishing submission build was a solid ending and gave Andretti a little rub. I would like to see a lot more ZSJ matches against AEW/ROH guys. Willow-Emi was even better than I was expecting. It was an excellent idea to have Emi be Willow’s first big title defense on AEW TV, because she was able to guide her through that kind of big match story. The Babe with Power meeting a powerful veteran who could match her, and who had a lot of tricks, managing to make a large, strong woman like Willow into an underdog. The finishing run starting with the pounce, and the battle for the Doctor Bomb. Loved this match. Willow has top babyface potential. Main had a lot more payoff for those who’ve been keeping up with ROH and Lee’s pure rules battles with Romero. Taiga showed he belonged and went toe to toe with The Wrestler, lots of reversals and painful submissions and stiff striking. Maybe they could’ve had Shibata use a rope break, that would have been a big victory for Taiga in and of itself. Finishing run starting with Shibata slapping on a sleeper as a reversal and ending with a heavy PK was fun. Garcia-Shibata at Death before Dishonor? On the other hand, Jarrett’s booking went from Memphis fun to Memphis bullshit and he’s on a short leash with me again.

One thing I want to mention in relation to Swerve: Nick Wayne’s debut is coming up in July against Swerve (on Collision, I believe). Darby & Sting are all of a sudden involved in this story between OC and Swerve’s group seemingly. I’m hereby requesting TK book Nick Wayne, Darby, Sting & Orange Cassidy versus Swerve, Brian Cage and the Gates of Agony.

Everyone seems very grouchy. Let's go get an Impossible Whopper and relax.